Behind The Nazi Origins Of The Volkswagen Beetle (1997)

The Volkswagen - Hitler's Car: How Hitler's people's car became a left-wing symbol.

VW Is Now in Mortal Danger, But It’s Not the Only One

THE TELEGRAPH: There is little doubt that the repercussions from the Volkswagen scandal will spread beyond the German giant

It is, at this stage, possible to say, without fear of contradiction, that things look pretty bad for Volkswagen.

Some of the numbers that have been generated by this scandal are scarcely believable. Volkswagen’s shares have slumped 35pc in the two days since news broke that the company falsified emissions data in the US to make its diesel engines look cleaner than they actually are. This is a more precipitous fall in value than BP suffered in the days after the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

About €25bn (£18bn) has been wiped off the market capitalisation of the German company, which has fessed up to the fact that 11m of its cars have probably been fitted with the pollution cheating software. VW has already set aside a cool €6.5bn to pay all the fines that are surely heading its way; some believe the figure could end up being fined closer to $18bn (£12bn). Read on and comment » | Ben Wright | Tuesday, September 22, 2015

’Worst Crisis Since World War II’: German Auto Industry Facing the Abyss
SPIEGELONLINE INTERNATIONAL: More than 1.5 million workers in Germany depend on the automobile industry for their jobs. But that industry is now facing one of its worst crises ever. Respected giants BMW and Mercedes are particularly exposed as sales plummet.

It was time for Martin Winterkorn to relax. The exhausted chairman of the VW Group was sitting in a leather seat on the company jet, coming from a conference in Berlin where he warned attendees of the consequences of the financial crisis. It had been a long day. It was 9 p.m. and he was still in the air.

"We have never before seen this kind of a crisis," Winterkorn, 61, said at the conference. The German auto industry, he told his audience, must prepare itself for a "tough, prolonged dry spell." It would not be possible to avoid "difficult cuts" and "painful" measures, Winterkorn said.

Even after the conference, sitting in the company jet, the head of VW was still preoccupied with the question: "How bad is it really?" Winterkorn has been in the industry for decades, and he has weathered many a crisis. But now he too is baffled. "I don't know what else is going to happen," he said.

According to Dieter Zetsche, the CEO of Daimler, there are those in the industry who believe that "up to 100,000 jobs will be lost in the German auto industry in the next 10 years." Some, says Zetsche, are even suggesting that this is "the worst crisis since World War II." >>> By Dietmar Hawranek | November 25, 2008

NZZ Online: Porsche drosselt Produktion: Absatzeinbruch erwartet

Der Sportwagenbauer Porsche erwartet im laufenden Jahr einen Absatzeinbruch und drosselt seine Produktion. Aufgrund des weltweiten Nachfragerückgangs hätten im Stammwerk Zuffenhausen erstmals am vergangenen Freitag die Bänder stillgestanden, teilte das Unternehmen am Dienstag in Stuttgart mit. >>> | 25. November 2008

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